NO MORE STRANGE FIRE!

[Rev. L.A. Artis]

NO MORE STRANGE FIRE!

Leviticus 10: 1-10 1And Nadab and Abihu, the sons of Aaron, took either of them his censer, and put fire therein, and put incense thereon, and offered strange fire before the LORD, which he commanded them not. 2And there went out fire from the LORD, and devoured them, and they died before the LORD. 3Then Moses said unto Aaron, This is it that the LORD spake, saying, I will be sanctified in them that come nigh me, and before all the people I will be glorified. And Aaron held his peace. 4And Moses called Mishael and Elzaphan, the sons of Uzziel the uncle of Aaron, and said unto them, Come near, carry your brethren from before the sanctuary out of the camp. 5So they went near, and carried them in their coats out of the camp; as Moses had said. 6And Moses said unto Aaron, and unto Eleazar and unto Ithamar, his sons, Uncover not your heads, neither rend your clothes; lest ye die, and lest wrath come upon all the people: but let your brethren, the whole house of Israel, bewail the burning which the LORD hath kindled. 7And ye shall not go out from the door of the tabernacle of the congregation, lest ye die: for the anointing oil of the LORD is upon you. And they did according to the word of Moses. 8And the LORD spake unto Aaron, saying, 9Do not drink wine nor strong drink, thou, nor thy sons with thee, when ye go into the tabernacle of the congregation, lest ye die: it shall be a statute for ever throughout your generations: 10And that ye may put difference between holy and unholy, and between unclean and clean;

Fire. It consumes everything it touches. It destroys. It kills everything in its path. Fire. It eats and devours until it is content. It takes the strongest of things, edifices and structures and leaves them in dark piles of ash. Fire. It doesn't just move that which is in its way out of its way - it burns it up. It rips to shreds anything that stands in its path and dares to defy its power. Fire.

God has put a burden in my spirit for holiness in the Household of Faith. There seems to be a mind-set of anything is acceptable in the House. You can live like you want to live but as long as you have a gifting it is allowed in the House. The unsaved are allowed to stand at the lecterns and preach to the masses simply because of their ability to send for electrifying orations, elocutions and eloquent dissertations. The unsaved serve as praise and worship leaders and the spirit that is in them hovers and infects the House of God. Altar workers are allowed to put dirty hands into the open wounds of the hurting who come to the altar for healing, hope and help. The lascivious sit on our music sections and send lust spirits through the worship service. The world looks at us and laughs why? It is because we are so busy trying to be like them that they mock us. They mock our vestmenst. They mock our programmed services, our formats and formalities that go forth with no power, no deliverance, no purity, no piety, no bowing, no brokenness, no holiness.

I invited my uncle to a service many years ago. I was asked to bring a short message during a midnight musical at our convention. We have been faithfully praying for his salvation for years. He has great love and great respect for me so he came. He sat in the back of the convention center and watched as flames of ungodliness sashayed through the service. He sat and watched shaking and shimmying during the worship service. My mother turned and saw him and asked him to come up and sit next to her. He leaned over to her and asked, "Have I been gone from God so long that the Church has come to this?" Before she could answer him he posed a second question, "Sis, I just left the club and there wasn't this much shaking going on in the club and we were partying HARD!"

The people who are in the world may not be ready to be saved but of this you can be sure, they still expect the Church to be the Church. They still expect there to be a difference between us and them. They still hold the people who Name Christ as Lord and Saviour to be different, special, unique, particular, chaste, clean, kind, prayerful, gentle, sincere, powerful and real. They still do. If the world expects this of us -- then what about God?

Our Christian television & radio programs are so lukewarm that they invite the unredeemed to sit and serve as guest hosts -- not because they have been washed in the Blood. They are invited simply because they are a highly recognizable name and so for ratings they invite the ungodly to sit in heavenly places and sing the songs of Zion (often not because they have been washed -- simply because their hot R&B careers have fizzled and died) and we the viewing, supporting and sowing congregants say nothing.

We wonder why the most gifted of our psalmist leave the ark of safety to make a name in the world -- it is because they don't value the gift in them and worse yet -- we don't either. We will run to the stores to buy The Gospel according to Patti LaBelle but when YOUR praise and worship leader who has been faithfully serving your church, your organization and your ministry releases a project and you refuse to support it or you get a copy of it from someone else and copy it! You pay for Patti but you steal from the psalmist that labors among you and breaks the bands of the wicked so that you can feel the oil of God running full and free in the service.

We think that just because it is done in the House of God that it is worship. It is not! We think that just because it was allowed that God is pleased! He is not! Just because it happens in the House does not mean that it is suitable for the House. There must still be a separation between the Holy and the Profane place.

The priests in the text offered up fire that was not pure fire. But to really understand how they got to this place we have to rewind and go first into the 8th chapter and the 35th verse. In this verse we clearly hear God telling them to "keep the charge of the LORD, that ye die not". As we travel on into chapter 9 we see God clearly laying out the plan for offerings to be given up to Him. If the offerings are given to God in the right way God will honor them with His presence. Verse 6 says, "This is the thing which the LORD commanded that ye should do: and the glory of the LORD shall appear unto you." If we do things His way, the glory of God will always appear unto the people of God. We then witness a powerful worship service. Aaron offers up many offerings - the wave offering being one of them and he raises His hands to God then towards the people and blesses them. Leviticus 9:21-24 "....Aaron waved for a wave offering before the LORD; as Moses commanded. And Aaron lifted up his hand toward the people, and blessed them, and came down from offering of the sin offering, and the burnt offering, and peace offerings. And Moses and Aaron went into the tabernacle of the congregation, and came out, and blessed the people: and the glory of the LORD appeared unto all the people. And there came a fire out from before the LORD, and consumed upon the altar the burnt offering and the fat: which when all the people saw, they shouted, and fell on their faces." It is right after this mighty outpouring of God, it is right after they witnessed the fire of God, it is right after they see the Hand and might of God -- in fact it is the same day -- the sons who had seen the Fire of God and had been warned to "keep the charge of the Lord that you die not" that they walkright away froma mighty experience with God to doing things their own way.

You would think that AFTER:

1. You would think that AFTER Witnessing - All the miracles God did in bringing the nation out of Egypt.

2. You would think that AFTER Hearing - The voice of God and saw the fire, lightning, smoke, and felt the thunder and the earthquake with the rest of the nation at Mount Sinai.

3. You would think that AFTER Worshipping GOD - They went up with Moses, Aaron, and the seventy elders for a special worship encounter with God on Mount Sinai (Exodus 24:1-2)

4. You would think that AFTER Seeing - The Sovereign God of Israel in Exodus 24:8-11 "Then he took the blood and sprinkled it on the people, saying, "This is the blood of the covenant which the LORD has made with you in accordance with all these words of his. Moses then went up with Aaron, Nadab, Abihu, and seventy elders of Israel, and they beheld the God of Israel. Under his feet there appeared to be sapphire tilework, as clear as the sky itself. Yet he did not smite these chosen Israelites. After gazing on God, they could still eat and drink. "

5. You would think that AFTER The Honor of Being Called and Chosen to Be Priests - That they would not risk losing all of these wonderful choice "God moments" by offering up "STRANGE FIRE" unto the Lord but they did. They were warned that they would lose their lives if they did not do the full will of God, fulfill the mandate of God and submit totally to the calling of the priesthood that they would die but they offered up strange fire anyway! My God!

We are in the hour of STRANGE FIRE! Preachers are sinning and they think no one will every discover their secret. People are in ministry living loose lifestyles and they think that their talent will be enough. Singers are living any kind of life and they believe that God will not expose their shame to the world. Sons and daughters think that because their parent is a preacher, deacon, bishop, prophet, prophetess, evangelist, popular and/or because their parent is saved, skilled, talented and gifted that they can offer up any gift and God will accept it. Not so! God does want to prosper the Church. God does want us to walk in Kingdom wealth, kingdom power, dominion, anointing, authority and might but the prerequisite to receive from the Hand of God is to be one who seeks the face of God and offers up clean worship, clean offerings, a clean life, a obedient life, and one who fulfills the entire calling of a priest. Not to do so is to ask God to kill you, destroy you, devour you, and yes burn you up. When the priests offered up STRANGE fire, the fire of God consumed them. God them tells Moses to get their bodies out. The men of God just don't take out their bodies -- they carry them out in their coats. This is significant -- this means that God didn't even want anything they had touched to remain behind. Whatever spirit is in you is in the things that you wear, own, drive, live in and possess. God is saying, "Leave no trace of the unclean in the House of God." When God calls for the removal of the dead things - He is going to remove them and every attachment. Everything that is not like Him must GO! They came to Him in a way which He had not commanded them. They came in disobedience. They came in rebellion. They came in themselves. They came in flesh. They came in "THEIR OWN WAY". Unauthorized! Unsanctioned! Ungodly! Unbelieving! They offered up the profane in the face of the Pure! They offered up flesh and self before Spirit. They offered up the unholy in the presence of a Holy God! STRANGE FIRE - PROFANE FIRE. Holy fire blesses. Strange fire is to hurl cursings before a blessed Father and God. They got fire from another source. It was not God birthed, It was not God unctioned or sanctioned. It was not God ordained. It was not sacred. It came from an unclean source.

Who laid hands on you when you entered into the ministry? Who consecrated you into the bishopric? Who sent you forth? Who birthed you out into prophetic ministry? Who laid hands on you in prophetic psalmistry and music ministry? Who? Was it a God birthing or were you birthed out by the bizarre, the strange and the profane? Ministry is always birthed out of the atoning and redeeming work of sacrifice. Fire, worship. praise, preaching, prophesying, laying on of hands, exhortation, rebuke, healing, ministry gifts are all birthed out of obedience and the shed blood of the Lamb. To come any other way makes your offering STRANGE!

They had the audacity to go into the Holy of Holies -- before the Lord into the Most Holy place to send up the FOUL, the UNWASHED, THE UNCLEAN and the STRANGE into the very nostrils of God! Eery fire is not God Fire. Revelation 13;13 lets us know that Satan himself will deceive many by sending down FIRE in the sight of men. That is why we must walk in discernment. That is why we must walk in holiness. This is why we must live godly and stay so close that we hear the heartbeat of God. There shall be many who can preach the House down but the fire within them is STRANGE! There shall be many that can sing the House to its feet but the fire within them is STRANGE! There shall be many that will give what appears to be truth but the fire within them is STRANGE. We have ceased preaching that God is a God of Judgment. We have stopped warning the people that our God is a mighty CONSUMING FIRE. But He is Church! He is! The same fire that brings Glory to the House simultaneously brings judgment. It is the same fire! God is Love but if you don't receive His Love He will cast you into Hell. He will yet love you but His judgment is yet sure. FIRE SEARCHES, DESTROYS, CONSUMES, PURIFIES, CLEANS and CLEANSES! The same fire can do all of these things. God is getting ready to release the FIRE of REVIVAL and while countless will be blessed, there will be those who will be consumed in the midst of the great revival that is surely coming to the land. God is sending a warning to every preacher, prophet, singer, musician, minstrel, intercessor, warrior, armor bearer, adjutant and worshipper. Your worship must be clean. Your life must be holy. Your walk must be holy. Your offering unto the Lord must be holy. We have lived in the dispensation and era of grace for so long that we have taken it for granted. There is getting ready to be a shake-up in the Household of Faith. God is setting His House in order. This is the LAST CALL! The next offering from your spirit, heart, lips, walk, and worship must be clean or expect to be consumed. God is calling the House to repentance. Your existence depends on what you do with the call to repentance and holiness. He is issuing a clarion call, a prophetic command and warning today - "NO MORE STRANGE FIRE!"

God is tired of STRANGE FIRE IN THE HOUSE...aren't you?

Rev. L.A. Artis, CEO ~ L.A. Artis Ministries, Inc.

"From the Heart of Artis"

Visit online at - http://laartisministries.org "The Heart of Artis" by L.A. Artis for L.A. Artis Ministries, Inc. ©2007 Copyright, L.A. Artis for L.A. Artis Ministries, Inc.. All Rights Reserved. DISCLAIMER: "The Heart of Artis" is copyright protected. Copyright 2007. The information contained in this writing may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or otherwise distributed without the prior written authority of L.A. Artis Ministries, Inc. (

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